ST driver Simp­son all set to com­pete on four rounds of the Bri­tish Rally Cham­pi­onship

The Liver­pudlian has pre­vi­ously com­peted in Nis­san Mi­cras, MG ZRS and VW Po­los, but has ral­lied STS ex­clu­sively since 2011.

Now the 41-year-old will tackle the full BRC for the first time, thanks to the Ral­lyme ini­tia­tive, an on­line fundrais­ing scheme, and his spon­sor Fly­ing Dog.

“We’ve got the bud­get to do four rounds this year,” ex­plained Simp­son. “It’s the ST we had last year, we’ll be el­i­gi­ble for BRC 4 so there are a cou­ple of peo­ple reg­is­tered. We can go and push, es­pe­cially in Mid Wales where I did well on Rally GB.

“We can’t wait to go back. I’ve never done the full in­ter­na­tional BRC, only the chal­lenge sec­tion. Do­ing the full BRC is still a bit of a child­hood dream for me even af­ter how long I’ve been ral­ly­ing. When you see en­try lists like the 1997 Manx you can only say ‘wow’.”

Simp­son pre­sented cov­er­age of the Bri­tish Ral­ly­cross Cham­pi­onship last year, but with no deal con­firmed to con­tinue this year, there are still ques­tion marks over his full plans. “The open­ing round of the ral­ly­cross se­ries is on the same week­end as the BRC in Wales,” said Simp­son. “If the op­por­tu­nity for TV comes up I would have to drop Mid Wales but we’d do the Scot­tish in­stead. As it stands our pro­gramme will be the Mid Wales, Pirelli, Nicky Grist and the Manx.”